I've only fairly recently begun using Twitter, and I rather enjoy it. Do any of you guys use Twitter? And if you do, what do you use it for? I'm using it to network, but also to keep up to date on things going on in the drumming community. I find that stuff winds up on Twitter before anywhere else a lot of times, because its so quick and easy.

Oh, and if you want to follow me, feel free to do so! I'll be glad to follow you back.

1. Businesses and organizations who move fast and like to shoot out updates to their customer base on what's going on.

2. Entertainers who use Twitter to either scoop TMZ or feed the obsessions of their fans.

3. Everyone else.

I am conversant with Twitter because of my job, but personally I don't feel that I have a need for it because I don't have a wide customer base. However, that could change the more I get into music promotion.

1. Businesses and organizations who move fast and like to shoot out updates to their customer base on what's going on.

2. Entertainers who use Twitter to either scoop TMZ or feed the obsessions of their fans.

3. Everyone else.

I am conversant with Twitter because of my job, but personally I don't feel that I have a need for it because I don't have a wide customer base. However, that could change the more I get into music promotion.

Yeah, that seems about right to me. A lot of the power users seem to be entrepreneurs though, although I suppose that would fall under the "businesses and organizations" group.

I'm on it, (@BrownCornelius, if you want to add). I like it personally, I'm following a whole host of rappers and emcees, a few drummers from my favorite bands, several comedians, and news and tech writers. It's handy, that's how I found out that the White Stripes were splitting, ?uestlove tweeted it one morning and then I just started hunting around the interweb for more info about it.

There are a few things about it that I can't stand, like the unnecessary retweets by people I'm following. Unnecessary, in the context of there's no news or information in it, its more of them receiving praise for what they're doing. I don't mind it from time to time, but when you see 7 or 8 minutes of solid retweets by the same cat, it gets a little obnoxious.

I'm on it, (@BrownCornelius, if you want to add). I like it personally, I'm following a whole host of rappers and emcees, a few drummers from my favorite bands, several comedians, and news and tech writers. It's handy, that's how I found out that the White Stripes were splitting, ?uestlove tweeted it one morning and then I just started hunting around the interweb for more info about it.

There are a few things about it that I can't stand, like the unnecessary retweets by people I'm following. Unnecessary, in the context of there's no news or information in it, its more of them receiving praise for what they're doing. I don't mind it from time to time, but when you see 7 or 8 minutes of solid retweets by the same cat, it gets a little obnoxious.

I sent a follow request! I know what you're talking about, a lot of times the retweeting can be annoying. Then again, it can also be a great way to see tweets from people you don't follow yet.

Can't spell Twitter without twit. Seriously though, I've never understood the reason for it. Maybe if you're some kind of movie-star or a famous band, but for more regular folks, you can always use Facebook or other social medias.
Never understood the fascination with people writing "Going to the toilet" and the people following. Maybe I'm just not star-struck enough..

If you are reading tweets from people telling you that they are going to the bathroom then you have some demented friends. I find facebook to be the more juvenile of the two with all of the silly games and garden growing etc. People criticize without knowledge and that is a shame. Twitter is a handy, well used by more than rockstars, social media outlet that has plenty of practical uses. I post one message and whomever is interested sees it. I don't have to type a bunch of emails to get my message to many people. There currently 190 million "twits" using the service.

If you are reading tweets from people telling you that they are going to the bathroom then you have some demented friends. I find facebook to be the more juvenile of the two with all of the silly games and garden growing etc. People criticize without knowledge and that is a shame. Twitter is a handy, well used by more than rockstars, social media outlet that has plenty of practical uses. I post one message and whomever is interested sees it. I don't have to type a bunch of emails to get my message to many people. There currently 190 million "twits" using the service.

I'm not criticizing the people using Twitter per se, but more the people posting mundane messages and such.
I've seen quite a few funny tweets from famous people, but for me it won't be useful for some time at least.

It can be used almost like a search engine. For instance I typed in Gretsch and found a bunch of drum, guitar related folks.

Absolutely! And the nice thing is that its easy to connect with the people who you find through the search. And in the future, they will continue to provide you with content you're interested in.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hellwyck

I have one for my band
One for personal
One for my music promotions

I keep track of my friend's bands

Thats the way to do it!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thaard

Can't spell Twitter without twit. Seriously though, I've never understood the reason for it. Maybe if you're some kind of movie-star or a famous band, but for more regular folks, you can always use Facebook or other social medias.
Never understood the fascination with people writing "Going to the toilet" and the people following. Maybe I'm just not star-struck enough..

There are a million uses. I pretty much don't follow anyone famous, except some drummers, and I happen to get virtually no stupid tweets like the one you referenced. I do however get insider tips from various drum resources, because they go to Twitter before anywhere else, since its so easy. To each his own, I suppose ;)

I don't use Twitter, but then again I'm not really a technological kind of guy. I do use Facebook, but my girlfriend kind of forced that upon me, along with my bandmates in order to make me help "spread the word" of what shows we have coming up and all that good stuff. And for that side of things I think it's great and I'm glad they have things like that available to everyone. But I also think it's like Myspace and after some time it'll lose it's appeal and become strictly a networking site for bands and businesses and what not.

Yeah, that seems about right to me. A lot of the power users seem to be entrepreneurs though, although I suppose that would fall under the "businesses and organizations" group.

What do you do for a job that you use Twitter for?

Part of my job as a graphic designer is consulting clients on social media use and applications. For example, one of my clients is a personal fitness trainer. He has a "fitness tip of the day" that he shoots out via Facebook, YouTube, and summarizes in tweets. Kind of a little sideline from the main job of drawing and typesetting and logo making...

Part of my job as a graphic designer is consulting clients on social media use and applications. For example, one of my clients is a personal fitness trainer. He has a "fitness tip of the day" that he shoots out via Facebook, YouTube, and summarizes in tweets. Kind of a little sideline from the main job of drawing and typesetting and logo making...

Cool, thats similar to what I'm doing. Once I get everything rolling, I'll be writing music, uploading everything to Youtube along with the video of me tracking the drums, putting the song files up on Bandcamp, blog about it, and then using Facebook and Twitter to spread the word. FB, Twitter, and Youtube seem to be the trifecta of social networking right now. I wonder how it will progress in the future... we'll see :D

For myself, I don't have any use for it. I'm busy enough with things in my own life and don't have time for yet another channel for distractions. I have face book, but only log on maybe once a month. For professional connections, I use linkedIn, where discussions are meaningful and networking is very productive. Everyone behaves because your reputation could be damaged if you engage in certain types of behavior.

You have to keep in mind there are producers of content and consumers of that content. For a business, it makes sense to use twitter because its a fairly cheap way to reach more customers; no need to manage or lease a server farm for electronic correspondence. If it generates revenue, great. It can also serve as a sales loss lead for future generated revenue. As for movie/sports stars and their ilk, I think they have the free time for the mundane communication.

Many people I hear of using twitter to "find good deals" end up buying things they would not have bought otherwise; meaning they are actually wasting money, not saving it.

Can't spell Twitter without twit. Seriously though, I've never understood the reason for it. Maybe if you're some kind of movie-star or a famous band, but for more regular folks, you can always use Facebook or other social medias.
Never understood the fascination with people writing "Going to the toilet" and the people following. Maybe I'm just not star-struck enough..

Everything is relevant to someone. I maintain dozens of Twitter accounts for businesses. If one of them sold or manufactured toilets, you can be sure I would be monitoring conversations about toilets, what people wanted out of toilets, what is the best toilet, who is buying a new toilet, who broke one, etc.

Imagine the ability to hover over millions of conversations and instantly sift through ones that were of interest to you personally, creatively or professionally. If you know how to use it, and care to use it, Twitter opens up thousands of conversations of interest.

Once, someone told me, "I went onto Twitter and someone was just talking about the burrito they just ate. Who needs to know that?" If you own a burrito stand or Mexican restaurant, you definitely want to know what people in your town are saying about burritos, where they are eating them, and how you can get them to eat your burritos.

Yes, that demonstrates my point. For the taco stand operator, it makes sense for him to be monitoring those conversations. But why would I, or any one else for that matter, take time out of my schedule and write about a burrito I ate. I have more important things to do. So its sensible for those building a revenue stream; not so sensible for the other chatters.

I think if you were able to see a breakdown of the twitter population, you would see it's used by business owners on one hand, and people with lots of free time on the other.

On another note, I surprised Twitter wasn't sued by TWIT (This Week In Tech), since they were around some time before Twitter.

playItLikeThis - I basically agree with you, Twitter is a great way to waste time if you don't limit yourself and direct your usage. I like what you said about most Twitter users being either businesses or people with extra time!

I think if you were able to see a breakdown of the twitter population, you would see it's used by business owners on one hand, and people with lots of free time on the other.

.

In prosperous, secure societies, most people do indeed have plenty of free time. Some use it to tell their friends what they ate/who they dated/what they are listening to/where they are at/the political assassination they just witnessed. Others may use it to talk drums on a specialty discussion board. Whether that is a waste of time is entirely up to the person taking the time.

On another note, I surprised Twitter wasn't sued by TWIT (This Week In Tech), since they were around some time before Twitter.

It is a little surprising. However, I think it'd be safe to say that more people are aware of "Twitter" than "TWiT". It probably made more sense to let Twitter keep doing their thing, and in the event of someone running a search it might pull a link or two to the TWiT website or some of their articles. Essentially inadvertently getting more traffic TWiT's way.

Although over the weekend Twitter made a stink about a couple of other twitter clients that have mobile apps. I think it was Uber Media's "UberTwitter" and "TwitDroyd". From what I can tell it was all about the use of the letters "Twit". You've got several others like Tweetcaster, TweetDeck, Twicca, Plume (which used to be Touiteur, but a lawsuit was filed because it sounded too much like "Twitter") etc. that didn't have any issues. Ultimately, a few days later, Uber media changed their app to "Uber Social" and everything's back to the way it was several days ago. I blame lawyers.

It's not a problem because Leo Laporte, who runs TWIT, doesn't have time for such foolishness and because TWIT is an anagram and Twitter is a word. The message itself is called a tweet.

LaPorte also thinks Facebook is dumb and announced he has cancelled his Facebook account.

Boy, that fellow is sure on the cutting edge, alright! He's good for nuts and bolts and hardware and gadget questions. As far as using these new tools of social media, LaPorte has his head stuck deeply in the sand ... or somewhere else.